


i'll sew my eyelids shut (so i don't have to be reminded of us)

by subtlyhaught



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: F/F, also tw for car crash, but here haha, depictions of blood!, i literally cannot look at it, yall i wrote this in 2018 im so sorry if its rubbish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:00:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23524231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/subtlyhaught/pseuds/subtlyhaught
Summary: Mal [8:43pm]:im sorry i broke up w you on your birthday
Relationships: Evie/Mal (Disney)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 56





	i'll sew my eyelids shut (so i don't have to be reminded of us)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RottenKidNextDoor (PortalofWords)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PortalofWords/gifts).



> hi i havent read this in two years and cant remember what triggers i should put but knowing me, probably abuse or allusion to abuse
> 
> HELLO i wrote this literally in 2018 (while mads aka rottenkidnextdoor was planning and writing in loco parentis which is... completely published) and originally it was gonna be a multichapter but i never continued it and then i never posted it but im finally... posting this as a standalone oop :) title is by letdown by nothing, nowhere which is also what the fic is based on. enjoy!

Evie’s room was cold.

Her walls were icy to the touch, and she wouldn’t dare step on her floors without at least four pairs socks clumsily slipped one over the other, needing something to dull the sharp sting of the frigid wooden floors against her skin. She supposed that maybe, just maybe, it was the lack of insulation that came along with living in a century old castle house that let in the chill, but her mother would never let her admit that outloud.

Truth be told, it wasn’t always awful - most nights the heating would be on and Evie would have her windows shut, a mug of steaming hot chocolate in her left hand, her glasses perched on her nose, as she turned the pages of whatever novel she was reading at that time with her right. It was peaceful. Serene, even. It was the only silence she ever really got, considering the rambunctious bunch her friends were and the fact that she lived with her old crazed mother. Not to mention her biochem classes that were kicking her ass. So, in all honesty, most nights she found herself really looking forward to this routine she had picked up.

But this night, which, y'know, just _happened_ to be the coldest night in November so far, Evie was just plain old suffering. The thermostat wouldn’t get its act together, no matter how hard Evie had tried to shake it into submission, and her window was jammed open, freezing even the duvet she was under so that it was nearly worthless to try and keep herself warm with it. 

Nearly. 

The silky blue material was pulled tight around Evies shoulders, trying to preserve any warmth her body produced - which, granted, wasn’t much, but - and her knees were pressed tight against her chest in an almost huddled fashion. She was in a hoodie that was a few sizes too big (Jay’s - as if her mother would ever let her buy a hoodie) and pants that were far too thin to be of any real use, but it was the best she had. Nothing in her closet had been updated to winter wear yet, despite the chilly month they were now well into. It was her mother’s request, to the surprise of no one, that she wear skirts to show off as much skin as possible for as long as she could bear it, and then for a few more days after that. Hence the tights being her only option.

She had lit a few candles earlier, once she had realized that there was no way in hell that her window would be closing that night. The flames didn’t really serve much purpose - the heat emitting from them being far too small - but they looked pretty. The orange haze they cast over Evies dark blue walls gave the room a welcoming sort of glow, what with the blend of the complimentary colours in contrast the white trim and furniture. She had placed an odd dozen around the space; a few on her two bookshelves that were crammed together in the corner of her room, books upon books upon books pressed against one another - a couple more on the small, white desk that was stuck between two wicker chairs that were lovely to look at, and less than pleasant to sit on, and two or three on the surface of her ridiculously expensive dresser that her mother insisted on buying her, so she could _impress future suitors,_ as she put it. 

The ambiance would be more than pleasant, if Evie hadn’t been freezing her ass off. So, she tried to distract herself from the biting cold, via the headphones pressed against her ears.

Evie wasn’t really paying attention to the music that was seeping in through the noise-cancelling gear, more or less content to let whatever lo-fi mix she had haphazardly chosen play without much more thought, letting her hand write line after line in her journal. It was an old habit, journaling, and one that she put a lot of time into. You see, Evie didn’t do the typical _write down your feelings and be done with it_ spiel - no, the brunette took it a step further; doodling and collaging and making her words into art; songs and poems and the like. She added relevant quotes when she so pleased, etched drawings of people and places into the margins, made the entire book hers and hers alone. And that’s the way she liked it. 

And that’s just what she was doing when she heard a faint, but very much present splintering sound.

To say it was concerning would be an understatement. Evie found herself pulling her headphones from her ears, and letting them hang around her neck as she perked her ears, listening closely for any follow up noises that would suggest she needed to go investigate. Otherwise, she was planning on, yknow, staying in bed and freezing for the rest of the night.

Several moments passed. Then a few more. And just to be sure, even after Evie was almost certain it was nothing, she still counted to ten in her head _just in case._

Silence. 

So, Evie shrugged, pursed her lips, and shuddered a bit at the cold chill she had let creep up on her. She figured it must have been, say, a squirrel trying to find a home for winter, who had managed to break off a branch from the massive Sycamore tree in Evies front lawn. Yeah, that had got to be it.

And she would’ve almost convinced herself and let it be, if her phone hadn’t chosen to light up at that moment with a notification. A notification, she noted, from a number she thought she had blocked years ago.

  
  


**iMessage**

Mal

_Active now_

Saturday, Nov 12th

**[8:43pm]:**

_im sorry i broke up w you on your birthday_

Evies blood ran cold.

She hadn’t heard from Mal since midway through senior year, when the girl had hightailed it out of their little town without so much as a goodbye, leaving Evie a wreck for days. Weeks, even. Her messages were going unread, her phone calls were being declined, her emails unresponded. They had had no contact, but it wasn’t for Evie’s lack of trying. She had needed answers, more answers than Mal would ever have the time to give her, maybe, but she had needed answers nevertheless - probably still did. All the contact she had gotten from Mal in the past two years came in the form of messages like _seen, 9:22pm,_ and, quite frankly, it wasn’t enough.

But now, here, with Mals name adoring her screen, she could barely find it in herself to pick up her own end and type. What was she supposed to say? _Hey, stranger, thanks for skipping town without a word,_ or _man, remember that time you broke my heart on my birthday? Because I do._ Those were too long, they didn’t seem to cut it. Then again, what Evie settled on didn’t exactly cut it either.

**[8:49pm]:**

_Why are you texting me._

It wasn’t what Evie wanted to say, not really. It didn’t encompass all the questions she had, or the responses she craved. It was simple, and guarded, and only slightly curious. She half expected Mal to not answer, leave her on read like the always had, but then the typing bubbles of an incoming text popped up and Evie found herself waiting with baited breath. It wasn’t like she had dreamt of this moment, or anything.

**[8:52pm]:**

_i crashed my car outside your house_

It wasn’t what Evie was expecting - not at all. In fact, out of all the reasons Mal could’ve possibly texted her for late in the evening, on a cold, _cold_ November night after two years of radio silence, this was not the reason Evie would’ve bet on. She considered the possibility of it being a joke. Maybe, Mal and her new friends at Auradon Prep were just playing truth or dare or something, and Mals ended up being _text your ex who you ignored for forever and tell them you crashed your car in front of their house,_ or something similarly specific. 

Until Evie remembered the sickening, splintering sound she had heard moments earlier. 

“Shit,” she hissed, throwing her duvet off of herself with a speed she didn’t know she possessed. Her bare feet hit the icy floor with a thud, and the brunette tried not to wince as she sped over to her walk-in closet and began digging around for some socks. The cold was even more biting now that Evie had stripped away her only true source of warmth, so she tried to move as quickly as possible; layering socks on one over the other and speeding across the hardwood floors to grab her phone. It went off a few more times - with messages from Mal, Evie would assume - but the brunette didn’t spare them a glance. If Mal had really crashed her car outside Evie’s house, then Evie would be in some deep shit once her mother came back from… wherever she went.

She slipped out the door of her room and stumbled less than gracefully down the old, spruce wood staircase that was just outside, leading to the downstairs foyer. The castle house Evie and her mother lived in may have been old, yes, but it was in top notch condition. The walls were perfectly painted in shades of blue and white all over, accenting each other with a sort of delicate unity. Grand chandeliers with beautiful clear gems dangled from the ceilings above the main entrance as well as in the dining room, giving the space a regal sort of air, and the floors were a dark spruce, scrubbed and polished to perfection. 

Which, as you may imagine, caused Evie quite a lot of slipping. 

The four layers of socks the brunette had on didn’t cause for very much traction on the shiny surface, and with the rush Evie had been in coming down the steps, she almost slid and crashed into the coat rack that stood by the front door. _Almost_ being the key word. Luckily, both for her and the coat rack, Evie had managed to slow her descent enough to stay on her feet, despite the wobble in her knees. She exhaled. This was going to be a long night, it seemed. 

Her phone had stopped going off during her tumble down the stairs, so she figured either Mal realized she had stopped reading her texts, or she had nothing else to say. Evie tried not to think of that as typical, truly she did, but she couldn’t help her mind from going to these less-than-kind thoughts anyway as she slipped on her winter jacket - something her mother had, thankfully, let her bring out once the temperature dipped. 

But her hand stilled on the door knob. Mal was out there. Her Mal. The same Mal she had grown up with, the one who knew her ins and her outs and her ups and her downs. The one who knew her speech patterns, the one whos mannerisms she adopted (she never quite got out of the habit of calling her professors _sir),_ the one who left her on her porch when all she wanted were reasons. What was Evie even going to say to her? _Was_ she going to say something to her? She hadn’t known when she responded to her text, and she certainly didn’t know now. And thinking about it this hard wasn’t really helping her situation any, so she figured she may as well do this the old fashioned way. Like ripping off a bandaid.

With a deep breath, Evie wrenched open the door. 

She was greeted with a wide, white expanse of snow, stretching out across her front lawn and into the field beyond it. The moonlight reflected itself brightly on the iced surface, blindingly brilliant even in the otherwise suffocating darkness. 

Behind her, Evie felt around for the porch light, hoping it would illuminate the scene some. As it was, she could make out the figure of what she assumed to be Mals car, front bumper stuck in the snow at the base of the Sycamore tree in her front yard. The back wheels had gained some air, and if Evie was hearing correctly, they seemed to still be spinning, if the faint whir of their rotation was anything to go by. Evie winced inwardly, hoping the damage was repairable - the damage done to the tree, of course. She didn’t care if Mals car was in tact or in tatters. Obviously. 

Her hand found the lightswitch, and after fumbling around for a moment, Evie’s front yard was bathed in light. 

The sight wasn’t pretty. Smoke billowed out of the crumpled hood of Mals car - Evie squinted at the model, hoping that it wasn’t, in fact, a tesla, because there was no way Mal could afford such an expensive vehicle - and it’s wheels were sunk so far into the snow Evie was positive there was no way she’d be able to get it out on her own. There was an ominous buzzing noise coming from under the hood - that was also absolutely wrecked, the windshield was completely smashed, and airbags from both the drivers side and the passengers side had been deployed. Evie was no car expert, but she was sure that that wasn’t a good sign. As a matter of fact, she couldn’t even be sure if the airbags had saved Mal from death, or if they had given her severe whiplash. 

The brunette took a step forwards, her boots breaking the iced surface of the snowy plain with a crunch. There had been no sight of Mal yet, and Evie tried not to panic. She knew the girl was alive - she had been texting her moments ago - but even so, thoughts of Mal crumpled and bloodied in the front seat still found their way into Evies mind. She took another step forward. 

She opened her mouth to call Mals name, unsure if her lips could even form the word, it had been so long, when a thought occurred to her that made her stop. Maybe Mal had run. Maybe, she had texted Evie to bring her out of her house, to get a rise out of her, to make her deal with the consequences of Mals actions. Just like last time. And, just like last time, Evie had fallen for it. 

The idea almost had Evie turning on her heel and marching back inside. _Almost._

Because just as she went to step back onto her porch, she caught a glimpse of blonde hair, and then Mal emerged from the smoke. 

Evies first thought was _wow, how dramatic,_ if she was being honest. Only Mal would have such an over the top entrance after totalling her car in her ex’s yard. But her second thought? That was more along the lines of _ah, fuck._

Mal was taller. That wasn’t to say she was tall, not in the least, but Evie figured she must be around 5’2 now. Her hair wasn’t purple anymore, and the asymmetrical bob she use to sport had grown out, leaving her with platinum blonde locks that cascaded down her shoulders, stained red near the top of her forehead with, what Evie assumed, was probably blood. Her face seemed more tired, gaunt, even, and older. All her baby fat from high school had disappeared, leaving in its place dips and curves, sharp lines, abrupt shadows - things Evie wasn’t used to, things she didn’t expect. This Mal didn’t really look like her Mal anymore.

That is, until Mal had taken a few steps away from the car, noticed Evie, and awkwardly raised her hand in greeting; the softest and most strained sounding _hey_ slipping past her lips.

The amount of junior year nostalgia that hit Evie had her momentarily reeling. All the hallway greetings and two am phone calls, the notes left in lockers, the cheering from the bleachers, all of it came back to her in this one moment, with that one horribly awkward gesture. 

That was Mal. That was Mal, and Evie knew it. 

“Christ,” she breathed, taking a few more steps towards the blonde and her car, still squinting in the semi-darkness. The collision didn’t seem to do any real damage to the Sycamore, which was good. The less questions from her mother, the better off Evie would be. 

“I know,” Mal winced, and Evie tried to not visibly react at the sound of her voice. “It’s bad.” 

“Yeah,” Evie agreed, eyes now roaming over the tesla and the impressive amount of damage done, trying to drink in the details the best she could. “Yeah, it’s bad. Do you have insurance?” she added, because yknow, that’s what mattered.

Evie turned to face the blonde then, watching as her face scrunched up, nose wrinkling and eyebrows furrowing, as if she was trying to come up with a response that wouldn’t make Evie want to throw her out a window. But at the brunettes raised eyebrow, Mal just sighed. “It’s not my car.” 

“Figured.”

“Rude.”

Evie blinked at Mal a few times, the banter between them really having been the least of her expectations. Especially because Mal was bleeding, and she was in a thin, thin shirt that probably made her feel like she was wearing nothing, what with the November chill, and her car just got _completely_ totalled and - shit. Mal was bleeding. 

Evie reacted without thinking, taking the necessary strides to close the distance between her and Mal. Her hands found Mals chin, and she tilted the blonde’s head towards the porch light so she could see better. Mal hissed in protest, or maybe in pain, Evie wasn’t sure, but the brunette only shushed her. The wound didn’t seem incredibly deep, but the bleeding was heavy. Evie frowned. 

“You’re such an idiot,” she breathed, releasing Mals chin, and instead pinching the bridge of her nose. “What were you even _thinking._ Driving in this area in the middle of the night, in November, in _that-”_ Evie gestured to the flimsy shirt Mal had on. “-whatever that is. Jesus.” 

Mal didn’t answer her. In fact, she seemed to retract into herself, shying away from Evies scolding tone. 

Evie stared a moment longer, eyeing Mals injury and trying to assess how bad it really was. Head injuries were always tricky - but Mal was walking on her own, so it couldn’t be too terrible. In the end, the sound of chattering teeth was what brought Evie out of her reverie. Her eyes were drawn to the way Mal was hugging her arms close to her body, goosebumps she hadn’t noticed before clearly present. 

Evie closed her eyes, and tried not to sigh again. “Wait here,” she instructed, holding a hand up to Mal to emphasize the statement. Then, without another word, Evie had turned on her heel. 

If she had to guess, Evie would say this was the fastest she’d ever sped through her house. Running wasn’t _ladylike,_ after all. She left her boots by the door, knowing very well that if she trudged wet footprints through her house she’d never hear the end of it, and immediately sped through the dining room and into the kitchen. Without a second thought, Evie threw open the cupboard over the sink and pulled out a kettle, as well as a box of hot chocolate mix - mint, Mals favorite. Or, at least, it used to be in junior year. 

She closed the cupboard with a light thump, and set the kettle down in the sink to fill with water, while she made fast work of finding her school thermos and two, old, plastic mugs that her mother kept hidden on the last shelf of the cupboard beside the fridge. They were subpar, it seemed, and deemed hideous. Evie used them all the time.

Once the kettle had water in and was set to boil, Evie dashed back through the dining room and rounded the corner of the foyer, bursting through the door at the bottom of the staircase that led into a bathroom. Evie hesitated then, eyeing the stark white room wearily. She never used this bathroom, much preferring the one on the second level. There were too many memories tied to the sink, the shower, the medicine cupboard. There was a clipboard hanging beside the mirror above the sink, with a list of all the supplies they owned, and a sign in/out sheet. There weren’t many items listed on sign out, something her mother made sure of. It was just scar cream and hydrogen peroxide, mostly. But nothing had been signed out in years, and there was a reason for it.

Evie sucked in a breath, stepping into the room and prying open the cupboard. The shelves were stocked with unopened bottles, boxes of bandaids, various essential oils, the like. Evie’s eyes traced over the items, until eventually, her eyes settled on the three bottles of hydrogen peroxide on the bottom shelf, tucked in neatly beside a couple rolls of white gauze. Evie caught her bottom lip between her teeth, and closed her eyes. This was fine. She wasn’t injured. As long as she didn’t use a lot, her mother would never notice. She wouldn’t ask questions. She wouldn’t pry.

Her eyes opened just as she began reaching for the bottles, turning them between her fingers. Two were still unopened, and the one that had been had expired nearly two years ago, and would be ineffective. So Evie steeled her nerves, hoped her mother didn’t regularly do stock counts, and pulled down a bottle that still had a year to go on it, as well as a roll of gauze, and some cotton balls. 

And then she had bolted from the room faster than you could say Jack Robinson. 

The kettle had come to a boil by the time she had gotten back to the kitchen, and Evie hastily poured the water and hot chocolate mix into the thermos, before precariously balancing the two plastic mugs on top. 

The walk back outside was excruciatingly slow. Evie stopped by the door, setting down all her items to toe on her boots again, and then pulled her mothers extra coat down from the coat rack. After draping it carefully across her arm, she tried to pick up everything she had brought with her with one hand, but ended up stuffing the bottle of peroxide and the gause into the pocket of Jay’s hoodie. Her newly freed hand fished her phone out of her coat pocket, and navigated its way to her emergency contacts. 

Jay answered by the time she had stepped out of the house again.

_“Go for Jay,”_ he hummed, voice catching slightly over the line. 

“Hey,” Evie started, walking towards Mal, who was looking at her curiously. The blood had slowed while she was inside, but it was still flowing. It looked like Mal had tried to wipe it out of her eyebrow, only ending up smudging it across her forehead, and Evie silently cursed herself for not bringing a rag. 

_“Evie,”_ Jay returned, and Evie could hear the creak of springs on the other end. _“Everything okay?”_

“Yeah,” Evie breathed, setting down the thermos and silently handing Mal her mothers coat, hoping it would stay clean of blood. “Well, I mean, no? But I’m fine. It’s just..” Evie huffed a sigh, and Mal looked away, shrugging into the coat that was clearly far too big for her. “Is your shop still open?”

There was silence for a second, and Evie almost thought Jay had hung up on her, when he spoke again. _“Not exactly, but you know we do special repairs for our favorite clients. What do you need?”_

Evie huffed in relief, almost smiling for the first time since she had heard the crash. “A tow.” 

_“Got it. I’ll- wait.”_ More creaks. Evie could picture the boy sitting up from the old couch tucked into the corner of the garage’s office. _“Did you crash your car? Dude, your mother’s going to fucking-”_

“No, Jay, no.” Evie cut him off, rolling her eyes in an almost affectionate manner. “I didn’t. My car’s fine. It’s uh..” she could feel Mals eyes on her as she spoke, the green hues still holding the same scorch they always had. Evie barely had it in her not to squirm as she continued. “It’s Mal.”

_“Oh,”_ Jay sounded somehow less than surprised, but still, Evie could hear the frown in his voice. _“Okay. Is she with you?”_

“Yeah,”

_“Does she have a place to stay?”_

“Do you have a place to stay?” Evie repeated, looking to Mal for a response now.

The blonde didn’t seem to notice that a question was being directed at her, judging by her absent-minded stare, but she seemed to come to once she realized that Evie had stopped speaking. “What?”

“Jay’s asking if you have a place to stay.” Evie repeated again, watching Mals face flicker through various emotions, before settling on what Evie could only think to describe as hesitant.

“Umas?” she voiced, wrinkling her nose a bit as she did, as if what she was saying sounded like a lie, even to her. 

“Is that a question?”

“I mean..” Mal paused, shifting her weight from foot to foot. “I haven’t exactly... asked.”

“Great,” Evie breathed, closing her eyes momentarily. She couldn’t just barge in on Uma at nearly 10pm, and especially not after Harry had moved in with her. She didn’t want to know what those two got up to at night. “Do you have any money on you?”

Mal nodded, and Evie almost pumped her fist in the air. 

“Jay?”

_“Hmm?”_

“Is that motel on your street still open?”

_“Should be.”_

“Then she has a place to stay.”

There was a jingle of what Evie could only assume were Jay’s keys, and the closing of a door, before suddenly wind was whistling across Jay’s microphone, assaulting Evies ears. _“I’ll see you in ten.”_

“Thank you so much,” Evie responded, before pulling the phone away from her ear, hanging up, and tucking it back into her pocket. Maybe this would turn out okay. Maybe this was the kind of problem that would just go away. Maybe Evie would never see Mal again after tonight, and things would go back to how they were. 

Maybe. 

But for now, Mal was still standing in front of her, sporting her mothers coat and bleeding from her head. 

“Okay,” Evie huffed, nodding a bit and clapping her hands together. _This_ was a problem she could deal with. The brunette leaned over, scooping up the thermos and the mugs once more, before motioning for Mal to follow her. 

She didn’t listen for the crunch of Mals shoes breaking through the snow behind her before she had walked herself over to her porch, untouched by the snow, and settled down. It was too cold to not try and get this done quickly, she told herself, pulling out the peroxide and gauze from her hoodie pocket as Mal settled down beside her. 

“Evie,” Mal interjected, eyes widening at the sight of the gauze. “Your mother-”

“Let me do this,” Evie interrupted, trying not to think of the multitude of reasons why Mal knew exactly what Evies mother would do if she had found the medicine cupboard raided by her daughter. She stretched her fingers a bit before pulling out a cotton ball from her pocket as well, and scooted closer to Mal. “Please.” 

Mal just nodded, and Evie pressed her lips together as she did. She tried to steady the slight quiver in her hands as she uncapped the new bottle of peroxide, and pressed the cotton ball to the top, pouring a bit of the disinfectant onto it. 

She hoped her hands weren’t too cold as she gripped Mals chin for the second time that night, tilting her head towards her so she could see the wound properly. The blood was definitely ceasing, which was a relief, but she still wished she’d have brought a rag with her. Without much warning, Evie pressed the soaked cotton ball to the gash on Mals forehead, and almost snapped her hand away when Mal winced. “Sorry,” Evie mumbled, continuing with her motions.

The two sat in silence while Evie cleaned Mals would, attempting to soak up all the blood she could. At one point, she soaked a cotton ball in the snow on the steps just to get it wet, and tried to wipe away the red mess Mal had made. Evie could only assume it was a painful process for her, who had poured herself a mug of hot chocolate at some point, because the blonde had opted to just stare vacantly at nothing, unresponsive and reacting minimally to Evies probes. It was as if she had completely tapped out. Evie wondered if she could be in shock.

She had just finished wrapping Mal’s head with gauze when Jay’s tow truck pulled into her driveway, and Mals eyes seemed to slide back into focus. She blinked once, twice, and then raised her hand to her head to feel the gauze. Her hands made contact with her forehead and she hissed, probably not realizing it would sting like it did. 

Evie didn’t react, choosing instead to sit back down beside Mal and watch Jay get out of his truck, jumping into the snow with a loud _crunch._ The boy was looking at the tesla, hand going to scratch at the base of his neck, giving off the impression that he was perplexed. Which, Evie figured, maybe wasn’t too far off. 

“Why did you come back?” 

Evie’s hand nearly flew to her mouth, eyes widening at the sound of her own voice. She didn’t mean to say it, not really. It wasn’t like she expected Mal to answer her. Maybe the blonde didn’t even know why she came back. Maybe she _hadn’t_ come back, and she was just passing through the town when she had slid on some black ice, or something, and wound up in this current situation. Evie didn’t know, and maybe she would never know, but right now she was still living with this void of questions upon questions upon questions, and maybe this was her way of trying to answer some of them. 

Evie heard Mal choke on her hot chocolate, and tried to stifle her laugh at the reaction. She turned her head to look at the blonde, who was coughing with her hand on her chest, and waited until Mal looked at her to raise her eyebrow. 

The two girls just stared at each other for a while, Evie waiting for a response, and Mal trying to come up with one. It was weird being around each other again, and Evie knew it. The conversation, however little there was, came easy. The kind of easy that only came after years and years of knowing somebody, loving somebody. And it was scary how effortlessly Evie found herself drawn in once again, to everything that Mal was, and wasn’t, and used to be. 

Mal opened her mouth to speak just as Jay walked up to them. 

Evie blinked away from Mals gaze at the sound of his boots, turning to Jay and smiling at him slightly. “Hey,” she greeted. “Thanks for coming.” 

“Of course,” was the response, the taller boy beaming brilliantly down at his brunette friend, before turning to Mal and sort of… jutting his chin out at her. “Shortstack.” 

“Hi, Jay,” she laughed, ducking her head slightly, as if she couldn’t look Jay in the eyes just yet.

“So,” he started, cracking his knuckles and stretching his hand out to Evie to help her to her feet. “Your car is pretty fucked. Both your headlights are broken beyond repair, and there’s some pretty bad internal damage I’ll have to get a better look at. But on the bright side, you got lucky.” 

Mal quirked an eyebrow, raising to her feet as well, and gestured blindly in the direction of the wreck. “You call that lucky?”

Jay nodded, turning to walk down the driveway once more. “Yeah, you hit the tree dead on. If you had skid and hit it sideways, the car would’ve wrapped around the tree and you would’ve been crushed.” 

“Oh,” Mal made a face, nodding. “Fun.” 

Evie listened to their banter quietly, walking through the snow until she reached Jay’s tow truck. God, this was even weirder than when it was just her and Mal alone. It was like high school all over again. “So… now what?”

Jay clapped his hands together, and then pointed at Mal with them. “Well, Mal, I’ve called the motel and gotten you a room - I’m the best, I know, I know, compliment me later - so all that’s left is for me to haul your car out of here and drop you off. Sound good?”

Mal nodded, and Evie pursed her lips, watching as Jay gave them a thumbs up and pulled his drivers side door open, before jumping in the truck. It made a rather obnoxious beeping noise as he backed out and lined it up with the rear bumper of Mals car. 

Evie watched, almost transfixed. She could hear Mal beside her, scuffing her feet on the snow covered pavement, and everything about everything seemed surreal. Mal beside her, the tesla in her front yard, Jay’s tow truck. It definitely wasn’t what she had pictured for her quiet night in.

And then she remembered.

“My mom’s jacket,” she said to Mal, turning towards the blonde. 

Mal, in turn, took a moment to piece it together. The blonde made a face, casting a downwards glance at her attire - the lengthy sleeves that completely engulfed Mals hands, the black and white and blue pattern Mal would never wear, the very much _not leather_ material - before she was shrugging out of the coat and handing it back to Evie. “Thanks.”

Evie only nodded, then gestured at the gauze wrap. “Keep that on, change it in the morning.” She said, voice coming out softer than she had intended. “There are more blood vessels in your forehead than in your hand, for example, so don’t be too worried if it feels like it’s still bleeding. But if you feel dizzy, or nauseous, call 911 and go lay down, got it?” 

“Got it,” Mal hummed, her arms wrapping around her body once more after Evie had taken the coat back. It was horrible what the sight was doing to Evie’s stomach - making it twist and ache with a familiar feeling of sorrow that had her shrugging out of her own coat. 

Mals eyes widened as the jacket was pressed into her arms, looking to Evie for explanation. “Please, just,” Evie shook her head, unable to meet Mals eyes. “Just take it.” 

And she did. 

It was too big on Mal by a size, and came down nearly to her knees, but the royal blue felt looked stunning with the white shirt and Mals blonde hair. It almost looked like Mal belonged in it. 

Fuck.

What was Evie getting herself into.

**Author's Note:**

> i-said-oops on tumblr and sagesaltz on twitter :)


End file.
